Overnight business summary

NEW YORK — Stock futures indicated a higher open to tradingWednesday as investors awaited key readings on the economy,including orders for big-ticket manufactured goods and existinghome sales.

Investors keen to know the health of U.S. manufacturing andhoping for signs the housing downturn has reached a bottom werelikely waiting for direction from the day’s economic releases. TheCommerce Department reports October orders for durable goods at8:30 a.m. Then, the National Association of Realtors releasesdata on October sales of existing homes at 10 a.m.

Later, the Federal Reserve puts out its survey of regionaleconomic conditions, at 2 p.m.

Retail news was encouraging. Online holiday shopping has gottenoff to a strong start, according to ComScore Inc. The Internetresearch company said consumers spent $733 million online onMonday, the official kickoff to the cyber shopping season, up 21percent from the same day last year.

The dollar’s bounceback against the euro, Japanese yen and othercurrencies also boosted investor confidence.

Wall Street has had an erratic start to the week. The Dowindustrials plunged 240 points on Monday — pushing the index to thelevel of a 10 percent correction — only to swing 215 points higheron Tuesday. Investors contending with the credit market crisis andlosses at major financial institutions got relief on Tuesday whenthe investment arm of Arab city state Abu Dhabi injected $7.5billion in capital to Citigroup Inc., the nation’s largest bank.

--AP

BERLIN — The dollar gained strength Wednesday following therelease of a consumer data report that showed the fourthconsecutive month of slipping consumer confidence in Germany,Europe’s largest economy.

In morning European trading the euro bought $1.4732, down from$1.4841 the night before in New York.

Likewise, the British pound fell to $2.0612 from $2.0687 thenight before, while the dollar rose to purchase 108.96 Japanese yenfrom 108.59 yen the day before.

The euro hit an all-time high of $1.4966 on Friday, the latestin a string of recent records triggered by worries about credit andinstability in the United States.

On Wednesday, the GfK research group reported that consumerconfidence in Germany fell for the fourth consecutive month despitethe end-of-the-year holiday season, driven by fears surrounding thestrong euro and high prices. That, and other economic developments,has led to speculation that the ECB will leave rates unchanged atits next meeting — supporting the dollar, said James Hughes, ananalyst with CMC Markets.

“The dollar continues to post incremental gains over both thepound and euro, largely as speculation builds that the ECB may nowelect to leave interest rates unchanged once again at next week’smeeting,” he said.

--AP

SAN FRANCISCO — After avoiding major trouble most of theyear, Wells Fargo & Co. has finally bogged down in the mortgagemuck that is muddying one major bank after another.

Wells Fargo, the fifth-largest U.S. bank, waded into the mess bysaying it will recognize $1.4 billion in losses in the fourthquarter on home equity loans that aren’t being repaid as the realestate slump deepens in California, the Midwest and other majormarkets.

Until Wells Fargo’s disclosure late Tuesday, the SanFrancisco-based bank had been largely unscathed by the turmoil thathas battered a long list of other major lenders. The company is a big lender in Florida, a state hit hard by the real estate downturn.

“Clearly, this is a disappointment because (Wells) had beenseen as better managers of credit than many other big banks,” saidRBC Capital Markets analyst Joseph Morford. “But now they have abig blemish on them, too.”

After gaining 34 cents to finish at $29.83 in Tuesday’s regularsession, Wells Fargo shares plunged $1.40, or 4.7 percent, in theextended trading that followed a Securities and Exchange Commissionfiling outlining the bank’s home equity loan losses.

“Maybe people are going to be freaked out about Wells Fargo’slosses, but they shouldn’t be,” said Punk, Ziegel & Co. analystRichard Bove, who is based in Florida. “Wells Fargo isn’t superhumanand they made some bad loans just like everyone else.”

--AP

HONG KONG — The Chinese manufacturer of a toy coated with achemical that can turn into a “date-rape” drug if ingestedapologized Wednesday for damaging the “Made in China” label, aquality-control agency said.

Hong Kong’s Jssy Ltd. produced the toy beads, coated with achemical called 1,4-butanediol, said a statement from the ShenzhenEntry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau.

When eaten, the chemical can metabolize into the so-calleddate-rape drug gamma hydroxy butyrate — which can cause breathingproblems, loss of consciousness, seizures, drowsiness, coma anddeath.

“The incident has given the ’Made in China’ brand a negative(impact) during the Christmas season. I have to deeply apologize,”company director Liao Juyuan said at a news conference in thesouthern city of Shenzhen, next to Hong Kong.

Worldwide recalls have been declared for the popular toys, whichare sold as Aqua Dots in the United States and Bindeez inAustralia. At least nine children in the U.S. and three inAustralia have become sick after swallowing the beads.

The bureau’s statement said Jssy had used the chemical becauseit makes the craft beads expand and fuse together when sprayed withwater.

VIENNA, Austria — Crude oil futures were steady Wednesday,as traders mulled differing signals from OPEC on whether it willconsider increasing production to ease near record prices.

The president of the Organization of Petroleum ExportingCountries said the group stands ready to put more oil into themarket, although it had no plans to do so yet. But several OPEC oilministers questioned the need for such a move.

Light, sweet crude for January delivery was down by a penny at$94.41 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York MercantileExchange by midday in Europe. Brent crude was trading at $92.83 onLondon’s ICE Futures exchange, up by 31 cents.

“We are prepared to raise our production to supply oil when andwherever required,” OPEC President Mohamed Al Hamli, who doublesas energy minister for the United Arab Emirates, said Wednesday. “There’s nothing on the agenda, (but) we are willing to supplymore to the market.”

--AP

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